I uncap my water, wishing to God I had something stronger, and lean back in my seat. The cool draft besides me warrants my attention, and only then do I see we’re alone now.
Weston and Daphne are MIA.
“Where’d they go?” Delilah’s face is washed in panic.
I chuckle. Good for Weston.
Delilah rises, moving toward the rope and pushing the curtains aside to peer out at the bar. She scans the place for her sister, rising on her toes.
“Relax.” I come up from behind, placing my hand on the small of her back. “Weston’s a gentleman. He won’t try anything.”
Delilah looks away. “I’m not worried about that. Daphne can hold her own. I’m just pissed she left me here alone.”
“With me.”
“Exactly.” She turns to face me, her eyes uncertain and one hand parked on her hip.
“Relax, gorgeous.” I say, capturing a loose ringlet of her hair between my fingers. I slide my fingers down the length of the tendril and let it fall to her bare shoulders “Hair looks good like this.”
She exhales, shoulders falling. Resolve weakening. I don’t know why she resists me so much. After all, less than a week ago she was lying in my bed, pussy clenched around my cock and legs twisted up in my sheets.
“Do you need another drink?” I point toward the call button on the wall as she glances into her empty martini glass. She doesn’t answer. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
“No, it’s fine. I’m probably going to head back to the hotel soon.”
“Seriously?” I check my watch. “It’s barely ten o’clock.”
“What else am I supposed to do? I’ve been ditched.”
“You can hang out with me.” I shrug. “Unless you’re back to hating everything about me again. I kind of thought we’d made some progress, but then again, you are female. Your minds change at the drop of a goddamned hat for no damn reason.”
“Here we go again.” Delilah groans, lifting her empty glass and siphoning a final sip of liquor.
“I’m not going to censor myself around you anymore, Delilah. I’m going to speak my truth, and fuck, speak yours too. If there’s something you don’t like about me, then say it. Stop rolling your eyes. Stop huffing and stomping and sulking like a toddler. All it makes me want to do is bend you over my knee and smack that ass of yours, and I mean that in the most sexual, adult, non-creepy fucking way possible.”
She hides a laugh behind her hand, facing away. When she turns back to me, her eyes have that glint in them I’ve only seen a handful of times.
“Fine.” Delilah sits straight. “You annoy me, Zane. You follow me everywhere.”
“Not true.”
“You act offended that I’m not falling all over you like some love-struck puppy dog.”
“Also not true.”
“You say the most offensive things and then act appalled that I take offense to them.”
“You’re overly sensitive.”
“You have no regard for any kind of rules.”
“Okay, now you just sound like Rue.”
“And every time I’m around you, you make me lose control.”
“Ah, there we go.” I move my hand to her hip and pull her into me. “That’s what this is about, Delilah. You not having control. It isn’t me or the things I say or do. This isn’t about me at all. It’s about you.”
Her brows meet in the middle and then relax, and her shoulders fall. She knows I’m right. I can see it in that defeated expression on her pretty little face. She just won’t admit it.
“I’m going,” she says. “I didn’t come here to fight with you.”
“You call this fighting?” I watch her move toward the rope, pushing the curtains aside and peering into the crowd. “You’re really going to leave right now? Un-fucking-believable.”
“I’m removing myself from this situation,” she says. “Before we both say things we’re going to regret.”
I stand back, watching her fidget with the ropes, trying to unclip the barricade and get away from me as fast as she can. In all my years as a grown adult man, never once have I dealt with a woman so desperate to get the hell away from me after a hook up.
It’s almost always been the other way around.
I move toward the ropes, unclipping them and setting her free.
And maybe it’s for the best that I let her go.
Clearly she doesn’t want anything to do with me.
Clearly I had no business getting her in her pants in the first place, but fuck, I wanted her more than I’ve ever wanted anything.
Still do.
And she was worth it.